Muse

Now, I made you a very special dish. It's spaghetti, but instead of meatballs, it's raisin balls. They look the same, but they taste very different. Do you want to know what they symbolize?

Uh, yes.

So, I'm the kind of gal who tries to make the best of things. And since meatballs will never, ever exist again, I said, Carol, get your hands up, grab some raisins, and you smash them into a ball, girl. I know we're not each other's soulmates, parentheses, meatballs, but if we give it a little effort, perhaps we can make it work, huh? Parentheses, raisin balls. So we might as well dig into the raisin balls, parentheses, life we've been given.

Mmm. You don't. You don't. These have turned.

Mm.

You might want to just eat around them.

Yeah. TBTL! for the number one show in hospitals and on sinking riverboat casinos.

This is about respect. This is about personal space. This is about the violation. Got it. Here's the long and short of it. Someone has been touching my karaoke machine.

This is Mr. T, and I want to tell you, out there in radio land, you better keep listening to this station. And if you don't, I'm coming after you.

All right, hello, good morning, and welcome, everyone, to a Wednesday edition of TBTL, a show that just might be too beautiful to live.

Oh, it might not be good for the mind, but it's most definitely good for the soul.

My name is Luke Burbank. I am your host.

I'm so happy of myself.

Coming to you from the Hollywood Broadcast Center right here in Portland, Oregon, where I am feeling happy of myself because I've got a new roommate, bubbles burbank the cat it's time for cat massage got her last night and i don't want to be overly dramatic but i would die for her that's what i'm trying to say madly in love with this eight week

old love is wearing makeup to bed and going downstairs to the burger king to poop first

thing i have to do well there's a few first things that i need to do now that i've acquired a cat one is to up the storage in my icloud account because the already the amount of video documentation and photo documentation of just the absolute just the jaw-dropping cuteness of what's happening in this

apartment i feel cute today look at my outfit i i'm not exaggerating i all last night i was just

following her around with the camera taking pictures videos went to sleep she woke me up at five this morning commenced with filming again and honestly this is the only break in the documentation of this cat is tbtl in fact episode 3681 in a collector series to be precise let the fun begin we actually have non-cat content to talk about on the show today including the slightly perplexing situation with john bon jovi's tour that he is on where it is very clear that he's not able to sing any bon jovi songs it was literally a major disaster i saw this circulating on the internet a while ago like on Twitter and maybe TikTok people just putting up videos and I thought well that's an interesting personality type to stake out the person who wants to blow the lid off of Jon Bon Jovi is not great at singing but now I've actually watched the videos and it's clearly dealing with something and I don't I don't know if I if I paid money to go to a Bon Jovi concert and he didn't perform really any of the songs I don't know if that would be satisfactory to me anyway we'll talk about that also a woman in austin bought a um a bust like a you know one of those like a head of kind of a she named it dennis reynolds because she thought it looked like the guy from it's always sunny in philadelphia she bought it for like 35 bucks or something turned out it's an actual roman statue it's an actual piece of antiquity that was in Europe and was looted during World War II and is very valuable and sought after.

That was the fanciest sentence I've ever heard. And I used to watch Frasier.

So we'll get into that as well. Plus emails and V-mails. And this guy, the longest-running cobro of the show, may be best known for his depictions of the tall ships. I don't want him to think that just because I have a roommate now and because Bubbles will probably be coming in and out of the studio during the show that he has been downgraded to the third wheel on this. He is still the co-host, producer, trusted colleague, and dear friend of mine. He's Andrew Walsh.

I'll say, what's up, dog?

And he's joining me right now from the Sweet Cream District of Seattle, Washington. Good morning, my friend. Why did I find that assurance more insulting than not offering? I realized midway through that.

I think that that actually was kind of a weird... Why would I think... Damning with faint praise. Why in the world would I feel second fiddle to a cat? Why would I feel at all... Have you seen the cat? And now I... Wow. No, I haven't.

Andrew, have you seen... Have you physically... Have you gotten eyes on this cat? I have not. Well, once you do, you'll understand why I needed to assuage your fears. Okay?

Well, congratulations for real. Thank you. Now I'm feeling a little weird. I have some self-reflection as opposed to other kinds of reflection. But let's move on from that. That's something that I can deal with in my downtime. But congratulations. Everything went well yesterday. This is a weird, very practical question, but I'm curious. Where was the actual handoff? You'll remember this handoff your whole life.

I will for a few reasons, Andrew. It was the first time I've been through something like this. So the previous cats that I lived with or had, I didn't actually do the handoff. I didn't get the cat. So the story with Bubbles was I was trying to get a cat through the Humane Society. It was pretty difficult to get a cat that was on the younger side, which is what I was really interested in. So I went on Craigslist and found a family that had a couple of kittens that they were looking to rehome, as the terminology is now. And so we met up when this cat, Bubbles, who was previously named Meowgly. I believe there's a super cut on marsupial gurgle of me trying to say Meowgly from a few shows ago. We met up outside of a PetSmart, and I checked out the cat, and they checked me out, and everybody agreed this would be an okay thing to do. but she was still so young and nursing that we said let's wait a few more weeks uh to um to do the the transfer so that she can you know be as healthy as possible so yesterday was finally the day when i was back in town and they were in town and we could do the transfer and becca and i went over there to their house in um a town it's called oregon city oregon it's you know probably 25 minutes outside of where i live in portland and what i had not fully thought through andrew was i was going to enter this the home of these this very lovely family the um the mother is from kyrgyzstan originally um and speaks tremendous english but was apologizing constantly for her english which is always funny because i said um i promise you your english is better than my russian

which uh you know was very true so i apologize for my english on the show all the time it's

the only language i speak for the record exactly so i what i had not fully played out in my mind was i'm going to come into this home and i'm going to remove an adorable kitten from the environment and even though the mother had very clearly said to me we we just don't we can't have because they had had the the the mom and dad so the the mom had had two um kittens it was her first litter so she had two kittens and and the human mother tatiana told me we just don't we can't have four cats in this house so like it was not a practical thing for them to have four cats they have two they have i don't know why the names matter but honey and leo they are bengal cats that was the amount of cat that this family could handle so this had all been agreed upon this was this was the best move for everyone but it also involved me taking an insanely cute cat away from her mom and dad putting her in a cat carrier where the mom and dad then came over to the cat carrier like huh why is our child in this cat carrier add to that tatiana's human child like a adorable 13 year old girl who was doing some amount of translating who of course is in love with the kitten and i have to there was a moment Andrew where if I could have said the deal is off the cat stays I would have because I felt like I felt like Count Olaf in a series of unfortunate events like if I had a mustache I would have waxed it I would have waxed the corner of and said yeah I'm taking this cat

away I felt so bad the fact that you showed up wearing a fur coat made of cat hair that's what

What did I wear on Tuesdays, Andrew?

I know, Luke. I know. But, I mean, I just think in this context, that probably didn't help things all that much. I did not think that part through. No, but let me ask you, though. So, I understand you were carrying a lot of these feelings into this encounter. How much evidence did you actually see? And I'm not doubting you. I'm just curious.

Well, when the teenage girl started crying, it felt pretty clear.

That's what I was wondering about.

Actually, what she said was she was keeping a very stiff upper lip. And I really said, I'm like, I am so sorry. but just so you know she's going to have a great home i'm going to really take great care of her i'll send you pictures you can facetime with her this is what i'm saying to this young person and then um um and then she started talking then the mom said through her you know somewhat accented English she doesn't really want to talk about it too much because she'll start crying again oh yeah and I saw the young girl's eyes well up with tears and I just said I'm I'm sorry this is so hard that was the moment Andrew where if I could have just said the cat stays I would be like I'll find another cat or I'll just get a Tamagotchi and raise it like it's alive I don't know like I just was so i felt so bad but again it was it was the agreed upon plan for everyone involved and the the young girl was just being about as as as grown up as you could be about it like she was really handling it better than i would have if i were her age and i had been living with a kitten for eight weeks or

whatever yeah um and i think that if you had salted the deal there i think i mean there's a very good chance that they would have just found another it would have been a pain for them because if they can't like yeah that's the thing i my friend has been um i actually have a couple of friends who've been fostering dogs they don't know each other it's just a coincidence maybe i got to that stage in my life you go through that stage of your life where all your friends get married then you go through that stage where everybody's fostering dogs no but i i didn't know anything about that process and over the past year or so i've been talking to my various friends about it and learning more about it and for them for for both of them that i'm thinking of i'm kind of surprised that they don't get more emotionally attached I mean the the day that they do find an adoptee is I feel like a day of mixed emotion for them because like sometimes they are you know they've been fostering a dog I think I think my buddy in Texas was fostering a dog for maybe close to a year so you develop some connections there but also not enough connection that they wanted to adopt the dog themselves you know what I mean so there was like this right it was emotional but also like I'm so glad that we found the right home for this dog. And I heard that from my other friend recently as well. Just being like, it's just, I know that the people who are taking this dog are going to love this dog and give the dog what I can't really give this dog right now. So hopefully there's some, I mean, I think with the child or the young person there, I think that that's a harder, that's a harder thing to kind of grasp. Or even if you understand it intellectually, it doesn't mean that you're not going to get, you and I cry on this show at the drop of a hat. So yeah, I mean, you're not, you know, don't care. sounds like an intense uh situation but don't you know i mean again the the the folks who you know

we were getting the cat from were could not have been more lovely and again this young woman was just like she was being great about it you know as great as one can be at that age uh she said i said do you want to like hold her or you know say goodbye or bring her out to the car she goes i know i said i said my goodbyes last night yeah yeah which was also i just like then my mind was like what was that scene like yeah i said my goodbyes last night so but i will tell you i sent uh tatiana the mom i sent her as i started the show by saying this cat's early life has not been under documented and i sent her tons of pictures of bubbles running around and playing and cuddling and having a great time uh and sleeping i mean what happened basically was i think it was pretty stressful for her to make the journey over here and so once she kind of settled in she just conked out for like a long time which i'm very into i feel like me and this cat are going to get along

really well in terms of napping yeah like napping with cats there was no um running the ground not finding a tiny corner and being scared that's a really good sign she uh no i mean so first she

was just kind of um you know exploring the all you know whatever 800 square feet of this apartment and then and then for a while because then becca left and then she uh bubbles went and kind of found like one of the closets she was kind of chilling in the closet which i was like cool let her just you know do whatever feels comfortable and then i went over then she'd just totally fallen asleep behind a shoe i mean it's the stuff that goes on here andrew is uh other people have experienced it with kittens but it is blowing my mind the level of cuteness um and so she i was just like okay we'll sleep it out and then she woke up and then she just kind of came toddling out drowsy and then you know jumped up on the couch and we just hung out and watched the baseball game and she slept with me which i was a little bit surprised about like i was i just didn't want to force anything on her yeah like as far as like you have to you know i just wanted her to get to be comfortable. And, um, but no, she's just kind of already my little shadow. And, um, and yeah, she, uh, she jumped right up on the bed and, uh, and like slept a full night. I woke up, she was behind me. And then I kind of got scared. Like I could have rolled over and crushed this poor kitten with my lummox frame. But, um, so yeah, so anyway, she seems to be settling. And this was what I was very proud of this morning. Oh, this was one other funny thing that this woman, Tatiana uh said to me she goes um what did she say I'm sorry

for saying this but she has beautiful poop i i'm sorry that both of you said that so i guess you know her because there's this this kind of cat she's a bangle and i guess they need like it's pretty specific the kind of food that they need and if you give them the wrong food their stomach is is not does not do well and so she was saying you know make sure you give her this food but basically because she's been on this particular food she's doing well and she's using the litter box she's not having accidents she's not having stomach discomfort and um i was so proud this morning because i went to scoop that litter box andrew and there was she had done her thing in there of both the number one and number two variety so she's already got it totally figured out which was a kind of a huge relief because if that would that had been a learning curve that

would just mean a lot of cleanup around here what she yeah you know what um that's something that always surprises me every time it works you know in the i guess i i guess quote unquote trained although there was no training really involved for three cats going back to to my cat alex back when i was about 14 years old and then uh the two cats that we've lived with as adults me and veves um you're always kind of like you're bringing this little kitten home you're just like i don't know how like i mean this place is you know to a tiny cat this environment is rather large i'm going to just set them in a box of sand and then know that they're going to come back down later and they'll

remember where that was yeah what they're supposed i did a bunch of stuff that i read about on the internet so i i put her in there and then i gently pod the litter then you to remind her that this is

where that happens then you slowly unbuckled your pants pulled down your drawer there was a point

andrew andrew there was a point last night during the game where i realized i have to go to the bathroom and i was i was using the bat i was pp-ing and she was pp-ing we were pp-ing together we were literally she was using her spot and i was using my spot and i just was like this is

gonna work great i got a little homie now i'm very excited i love how um social and sociable is i don't know if i'm is sociable even a word i feel like it's a word but i don't know the difference between social and sociable i just said them both just so i sounded like i knew more words i like it i apologize for my english um but um that's really great and i you know i kind of forgot like before bananas i always assumed that was going to be the case with cats and i always considered myself I'm talking about as I as a kind of a kid and a young man like in my early 20s I was very cocksure with my relationship with cats because they just I always tended to win them over if I was at a party I just remember being like young and going to parties and you know if there was a cat around that was maybe a little standoffish give me like a couple of minutes with that cat I know you scratch the cheeks they come around like I always prided myself in that and I've kind of forgotten by living with bananas for 11 years now who's just you know my first really skittish cat and even now like moving uh you know moving homes again with her um we've been spending the past you know month really trying to coax her into just being comfortable in herself again which she's made great strides in but like i'm jealous i forgot that some cats are just like and probably more the majority of cats are just like hey want to hang

i could use some pets right now i mean it's pretty early in this relationship but it seems like this like bubbles is kind of inclined towards that which i'd heard was a thing with this particular breed as well although i'm kind of surprised that she's leaving me alone so i'm in the studio the door is cracked a little bit so she can come and go my guess is that she is dead asleep on the couch right now which is which again is is great like i was so she and again to the people who have human children who are here we talk about this with such like wide-eyed wonderment i'm sorry but like as if this is some you know a story that's never been told but like so she woke me up at like five this morning so then we went and sat on the couch and i kind of like i've got this toy for her you know like whatever a little feather thing on a string and so i kind of was playing with her and then i decided to put the blanket over my legs and just kind of like rest my eyes which by the way extremely strong echoes of when i was the father of a human child who was young which was addy waking up you know early on a saturday i'm like a single dad and then i'm just like okay uh why don't you jump up and down on the bed while daddy rests his eyes so it was like that like i'm just gonna and so i did i kind of closed my eyes i fell back asleep and then she just went back to sleep like in on the blanket kind of between you know my legs or whatever like where my legs were were spread apart and she was just like out for another however many hours and i was like this is great i love that she'll just go to sleep if i you know if i go to sleep it seems like her move is to go to sleep so that's also very encouraging because she wasn't like bothering me or climbing on my face or anything so oh that's great um i look

forward to meeting her in denver um that's are you getting a separate plane ticket or what you just my friend you just but i actually had the thought not

Thank you.

today not like pre like weeks ago i thought it would be a funny subplot for the show if we had a kitten running a moke in the uh place that we're broadcasting from but then i and if it were just up to me maybe i would but you know you and i have already talked about off air that the people who own the place that we're staying in seem a little kind of um high strung yeah according to the

listing there's a lot of like yes we've been burned before we are monitoring how many guests

are you going to have there it's a very weird hilton they keep asking how many guests we're going to have and they keep talking about being burned before it says go bonvoy yourself i don't know what that means that seems aggressive no but i i honestly thought it would be kind of funny if we had a cat living there with us but i also thought the people who i mean i can say this it's we're getting an airbnb so the people who have the airbnb there's probably some kind of cameras it probably would be a bad idea because if something went wrong we could be on the hook for Or more importantly, APM could be on the hook.

Also, probably, you know, the cat's just gone through a major transition. Even if you're not there, I assume Becca or some friends will be watching Bubbles while you're gone. I also just don't think that's the best thing for the cat. I mean, goddamn, I would love that, obviously, to have a kitten there. But maybe after just such a huge transition, not another transition two weeks later, you know, for a vacay.

but see that's okay that's actually what i was meaning to mention a moment ago is the problem for me right now is i'm so obsessed with this animal like when i was sitting on the couch so then i got up you know later i woke up and i had my laptop and i was just kind of sitting there on the couch and she was just again kind of in between asleep and awake and she's looking at me with these giant blue eyes and i just thought can andrew do this show by himself today like i don't want to move from this couch to the other room to do this what is a very fun job talking to you every day because i am so in love with the moment that's happening on this couch with her snuggling with me and more on a more on a larger scale i'm like now don't take this the wrong way because obviously we're gonna have a wonderful time we're gonna raise a bunch of money for tbtl we're gonna see some tens like i'm excited about it but some part of me is just like could we just do the tbtl on from my apartment ideally from my couch with the cat sitting on me like i all of a sudden i'm like i don't want to go anywhere like i have a lot of generally in life i think i have a lot of fomo i'm just they're the people that are wired like me and genevieve and the people that are more wired like you andrew where towards the end of the night you're kind of looking for andy times which is go home have your fun maybe you know play a video game or kind of just zone out a little bit do your thing and people like me and genevieve and camara we're like where's the next

thing you know yeah phobia fear of being included that's a show title um but um so i i just have

this general thing of like oh where's the fun happening and i have to say i may never leave my house again like at least unless i have to for professional reasons because i was literally thinking if cbs calls me and it's like hey can you go to this place for a story my answer is no i can't i just want to be in this apartment watching the mariners with this cat that's the only priority in my life right now and sorry to my human daughter who might hear this but you know and she's fine get cuter okay um that's all you got to do you'll see so i'm just saying this is gonna i think this is gonna impact at least for a while and this is probably normal but for a while i think this is gonna impact like i'm going on a jog later and i'm already like okay I'm doing four miles because I can do four miles in, you know, 34 minutes or whatever. And that's the maximum time I'm going to be gone from this cat. Like I would do five miles, but I don't want to be gone for 41 minutes. I want to be gone for 34 minutes.

It's a very cliched joke that once a cat is on your lap, everything else becomes a secondary priority because you don't want to disturb the cat. Right. And I think I've mentioned to you before that I follow a lot of like New Yorker style cartoonists on Instagram. I don't know exactly how that happened. And I think I started following the New Yorker and then I started, you know, clicking on the tags of the people who are making the cartoons, whatever. It just ends up being a decent chunk of my feed. And you'll see so many cartoons where it's kind of like just saw one the other day. That's like a bunch of firefighters who are like sliding down the pole, getting ready to fight a fire. And the one guy is in the firehouse saying, I'll catch the next fire. And there's a little cat on his lap. And you're like, that's funny to me now.

And I was literally I was that would have been funny to me two days ago.

now it's hilarious i was reading that and just thinking like yeah we get it it's a cliche joke but at the same time i'm like vives can you bring me a coffee like it's like bananas is on my lap and like god forbid i disturb professor bananas who's finally settling into the new place and part of settling in is having to sit on my belly at all times i'm just like it's like both i can roll my eyes at these jokes while

actually living out these jokes exactly well the thing is like i you know i because it would be impossible for me to ever just have a relatively private experience that was meaningful i had to externalize it by putting a video up of the cat on twitter yesterday um saying like something like i finally got a roommate and it's just this quick little video of me walking into the apartment and then there's this cat and lots and lots and lots of people liked it and we're posting pictures of their cats and were just like you know really giving me the feedback that i was clearly looking for which is like what a cute cat and all i swear to you andrew i all of a sudden felt like i was i get this community of cat people now and again i know that i had a cat olive who i really loved like i thought olive was a cool she was a really beautiful and really kind of interesting cat but she was not social she was not very interested in like you know playing with with me or us or like you know every once in a while you're watching tv what really she liked to cuddle with rudy which was adorable for its own reason but this because you know i went and got this cat myself and it's the two of us living here and stuff this the kind of emotional connection i'm feeling to her is obviously very intense as people have picked up but so much like all of a sudden i'm seeing somebody with you know like a cat in their like twitter bio or like you know their photo or their what do you call that you know your avatar bill not billboard but whatever that oh the larger picture banner i guess someone will have a cat and i'll be like oh yeah those people get me i get them like it feels like i'm like have been admitted to this world of like of caring about cats to a degree that could someday become my personality um which i always was kind of like okay we get it the cats they're cute we all love our cats it's fine it's fine it's fine and now i'm like oh okay this is why everyone's been being this way regarding these little animals yeah i I did also have the thought last night, Andrew, I already started feeling sad about the fact that she's going to die. Good Lord. After the Mariners won. By the way, Mariners won an O while this cat has lived with me. So let's not sleep on that.

Mariners also won an O with runs that shouldn't have really counted because somebody was clearly out at first base.

But hey, whatever. What a. Well, I mean, I thought you're talking about when the ball got hit out of the mitt.

I was only listening on the radio, so I could be wrong, but it sounds like that should have been an out, and I think that would have prevented the run that actually –

I think that's a bit – well, I don't know. It's on the line because the question was did he intentionally try to whack the ball out of the guy's mitt, and it kind of wasn't quite that. It was on the line, I think. But point being, yes, it was we were I mean, considering that we got a bunch of hits that were all like where we we they were like swinging bunts. They were basically like where we were trying to hit the ball very far and we messed up so badly that we only hit the ball eight inches. But that was that was like harder for them to field than a fly ball.

Like crazy like a fox is what we call that crazy like bubbles.

So, yeah, the, you know, I think this portends well for our baseball team. So anyway.

Does it portend well for the portends? I don't know, Luke. I just heard it. You said portends and I heard it.

The portends who've had to listen to and will have to continue to listen to me talk about this small animal that's living in the house.

Well, don't, I mean, but I mean, don't be falsely modest about that. I mean, obviously, people are very thirsty for this cat content. I mean, I think people are finding it delightful.

Well, I mean, to a degree, but I may have slaked that thirst.

I think you're okay on day one.

With 29 straight minutes of being like, I got a cat, and they're cute. I don't care how thirsty you are. You've been able to drink from the whatever, the trough. Speaking of which, by the way, I have so much pet-related stuff showing up from like, do we do ads for Chewy.com? Have we ever done ads for Chewy? Can we start?

can i get a annie can i get a hookup annie let's get on farmer's cat um i know we've done various pet related things i don't know if we've done you or not i love the idea of farmer's cat

this is just at farmer's cat i feel like the person who does the voiceover would sound either like sam elliott or maybe wilford brimley there's just something about a farmer and it's just like A shot of, like, an old crusty farmer on a John Deere, but he's got a cat riding with him? Yeah.

Now, there's actually a cat commercial. There's two of them that are running now. The first one is actually really good. Like, it's one of those commercials where I could watch it over and over, and I thought it was, like, a great skit. They then followed up with another one that I think is not as good and too broad. They kind of, as is often the case with follow-ups, they kind of ruin the joke. But the first one is this guy is going around, and he's got a cat. It's a pickup truck commercial. I don't even remember. Oh, I remember that. I don't even... probably a ford i don't know but he's going around with this cat he's doing things in his truck but meanwhile the cat is just doing phenomenal things just phenomenal fetching and going into the water and doing all this cool stuff and at one point you know near the end of the commercial the guy is his uh truck parked at some you know lake shore somewhere and he's loading something up and he throws a stick way out in the water and the cat lunges into the water and retrieves a stick and brings it back and uh some some other fella some stranger is there and he's like that is just astounding and of course the joke is this guy thinks that this stranger is talking about his new uh futuristic truck bed or i should say tailgate that has multiple steps or whatever step or something yeah and he's he's and he's like no i'm talking about the cat he's like what you've never seen a cat before he's so unimpressed with his amazing cat but he's very impressed with

his tailgate that's the story of that commercial the well that's the kind of cat i'm trying to raise andrew and that's the thing too like i i do actually have a um like a a harness for her like you know like a leash and like a little kind of harness that i could conceivably like i don't want to be the person who you see in public with a cat on their shoulder i don't think that's really my look but i would like her to be as chill as possible and as able to kind of just be around and you know i'm going to be going back and forth a lot between this apartment and this house that i bought and like i would like to be able to kind of bring her back and forth and have her just be you and obviously that commercial is played for a joke that's not a real thing but there are sometimes those cats that just seem like i saw somebody on whatever it was probably tiktok who would oh no i was talk sorry i it was like andrew do you know there's this thing called real

life it's like you tell it to me like it was a tiktok i think i'd like it better it's like tiktok

but the people are in three dimensions you can touch them you shouldn't but you can uh-huh i've been asked not to by many of these three-dimensional no i was i was uh oh phooey am i i can't remember exactly who was but i was talking to somebody who told me that they had a cat because i'm obviously i was droning on about this cat i was going to get they had a cat that they would take hiking oh and um and and that they would just oh you know what it was my friend terry fitch uh who's uh um a big part of uh the live wire her husband toby fitch is on the board of live wire anyway i was at their house here in portland and she had a cat that she would go like backpacking with and the cat would just like walk next to her and she would like go backpacking pitch her tent the cat would hang out like so i mean that's probably pretty rare but there are those there are those sort of like rare moments where you have a cat that's like that just kind of like whatevs and i don't i wouldn't foresee that for for this cat of mine but i would like it to be more towards that end of the spectrum uh than you know like can't really you know handle very much i mean of course everybody wants their cat to be less of a hassle as opposed to more of a hassle but i'm kind of hoping that happens to that end i introduced her to randy this morning which was also hilarious just like i figured she's gonna well because you had said this the other day andrew and i don't think i had fully grasped it but like already how much litter was going to be just gently distributed through my apartment yeah and i mean we i have a mat and you know she's a small cat and she's only been in that litter box a few times but even so just a little here and there and so i was like this is going to be something that i'm going to have to develop a system for so i was going to wait a while to start the roomba because i just didn't want it to be scary to her but then the litter kind of spread around randomly and also the fact that I thought it's probably sooner rather than later right like she's gonna have to get used to this thing at some point so I fired the Roomba up and it was it was as adorable as you might imagine just lots of moments of the and I filmed all of it and I'll be showing it to you Andrew when we're in Denver just the Roomba just like coming through the frame and then just a cat looking out from around a corner like what on earth is that okay but but how was her reaction

like mostly sounds like chill because some cats are just terrified by vacuum cleaners anyway neither of my cats really liked the vacuum cleaner much um they get older and mellower but um i an autonomous vacuum adds another dimension to that do you think that it was like a little bit like bubbles was a little bit cautious but eventually like things will smooth out you're not worried

about using it no because she i mean she didn't want to go anywhere near it but she also didn't go hide in the closet i've also got every there's weirdly a lot of closets in this apartment and um i have every closet door open so that she can go like have a chill out zone anywhere she wants but that was not the case i was wondering if she was going to go high but no she would just she was just tracking it constantly but from like five feet away oh she'll probably be writing it

by some point then.

Somebody already put that on Twitter because I'm i put a little video up of her it it really does seem like a disney movie i think i wrote some stupid joke like from pixar and the mind of lin-manuel miranda coming in december it's bubbles and randy because like i feel it feels like a disney pic like a nervous cat a determined roomba a friendship for the ages like she will really be probably writing that thing in you know in a matter of uh weeks so okay all right now i'm even bored of talking about this thing so which is usually when we finally when we finally retire a topic is when we're not when the listeners

are bored no when we're we we passed that line uh several we just keep driving over that line well i'll tell you what if we're gonna take a break here why don't you just go i'm sure you're gonna do this anyway but just go see what the situation is she's probably out there sleeping

and i'm gonna videotape it andrew i'm gonna send you a tape and i'm gonna get some more coffee okay Sounds good. Okay. Quick break and then back with more TBTL in just a moment.

We was hoping for some razzle-dazzle. Razzle-dazzle. That's right, man. Razzle-dazzle.

On your mark. On your mark. Get set. Get set. Now ready. Ready. Go.

Everybody razzle-dazzle.

Hey, let's thank some dazzling donors. These are the wonderful, generous people who are dazzling us with their donation of dough. Andrew, I am holding bubbles now. Oh. Because I went in the other room, and she was, in fact, not asleep. She was just chilling on the couch. But then when I came back in here, she started kind of meowing and seeming, hey, say hi to everybody. Say hi to everybody. Wow, that sounds like a sound effect. It's so perfect. Yeah. See, Andrew, this is where the co-hosting begins. All right, Kat, I'm going to put you down.

I wonder if that means she's going to be pretty vocal her whole life My cats didn't start to get really vocal until they were much older But I can't remember what they did when they were kittens

What this one's doing is absolutely terrifying herself with her own tail I put her down on the ground Her tail bumped the back of her ear And she did a backflip Trying to get away from her own tail Anyway, we want to thank some of the people who are making TBTL possible in particular today's episode we're starting with gregory brown in pomona california uh i believe my dad walt b lived in pomona california as a youngster uh gregory says hey y'all this is going to start out kind of somber but i'll try to get the nose up on the negativity train in a second i lost a dear friend this week and it may sound ridiculous but andrew and luke helped me so much uh gregory sorry to hear about that um that's uh that's really really hard um gregory says i've been thinking of the episodes where you remembered and grieved your friends newman and theo and the friend of all the tens one mike frizell i was in um austin a while ago andrew like it you know after uh mike's passing and it was really it was it just kind of hit me i mean that's how grief works, right? It kind of, you know, you, you compartmentalize it for a while and then something just either you're in a place that reminds you of that person or, you know, something happens and you just kind of right back there. But yeah, my brain will not accept that

he's gone for whatever that's worth. I keep forgetting. There are certain, um, believe it or not, there are certain commercials that I always think of him about he, cause he hated certain commercials. He just hated them so much. And there was a commercial where a little girl, or I guess a young woman, little girl, I can't remember, but she was like so modern that she didn't really know what a computer was. She only knew what her tablet was, and so she was like, what's a computer, like kind of putting us all in our place? And it was a very irritating commercial. I remember that commercial, by the way. We hated it so much, and Vives and I will still say that to each other. Sometimes I was like, hey, Vives, can I use your computer? What's a computer? And then I'll think of Mike, and it's like, it just doesn't make sense that he's not here.

I know. He would, particularly when the Mariners were on that 10-game losing streak, He would have some choice roasts for those players anyway. Continuing with Gregory's message. It hasn't been easy, but the way you processed your emotions has helped me as I cope with the loss of my dear friend Samir. So anyway, I want to remind the listeners to do that thing you've been putting off, but you know you need to do the dermatologist appointment or calling a friend you haven't spoken to in a while. You know what it is for you. For me, it's filling out this dang, dazzling donor form. That's a lot of Ds, dude. If you hear this, I got it in even though it's way past the deadline. Take this message as a sign to handle it. You'll be glad you did. Another request, and this is a long shot, but I'm looking for a crew member to race with me on my little sailboat. It's a vintage Lido 14, and we sail Thursday evenings in Long Beach. I'll put my contact info on.

On Slack, a few days after this message airs, if you are interested. So if you are in Southern Cal, if you're anywhere near Strong Beach, and you want to go sailing with listener Gregory on a Lido 14, a vintage Lido 14 at that, the opportunity is there.

Are you in bubbles now moving to Long Beach?

She's already been through a lot, as you pointed out, Andrew. She's just getting settled into Portland. I think that would be a lot for her. I'm also realizing that the amount of cables that are in this room that are just prime for her interacting with, you know, running from the soundboard and my I've already got my headphone cables like all kind of wrapped up on the desk that I use with my phone sitting on them. Like it's going to be a whole thing if this cat's going to be in here when I'm doing the show.

You should literally I don't see this enough, by the way. The classic thing is a cat playing with a ball of yarn. Right. and except for like the knitters in our lives who are actually trying to knit and then their cats might grab their yarn that's annoying why are we not just buying our cats and kittens balls of yarn would that not be the cutest thing luke i'm giving you this assignment just go out today i mean i'm sure you have a lot of fun cat specific toys but just go buy a classic ball of red yarn and just put it in the middle of the room and then you can just keep wrapping up the internet

You know, I do have a bunch of different fancy cat distractions, and the thing that she is the most obsessed with so far is a crunched-up wad of paper. Yeah, of course. Just absolutely cannot get enough of that. So that's encouraging. That would mean she'd probably be really interested in a ball of yarn. Anyway, Gregory, thank you very much for supporting the show. Really sorry to hear about your friend Samir. Yeah. But also glad to hear that TBTL has provided at least a little bit of comfort. So we'll be thinking of you. Maestro.

On your mark. On your mark. Get set. Get set. Now ready. Ready. Go. Everybody rattle down.

I want to mention that Gregory put Maestro in his dazzling donor message and then wrote, don't read that if I'm the second guy. I'm glad you pointed that out.

I was about to as well. I didn't want to step on you. Yes. Thank you for producing the piece up.

Thank you for producing this up, Gregory. We really do appreciate that. We also want to thank Hess of Clarksville, Tennessee. Hess checked in, I feel like, on one of those Zoom events that we did from Clarksville. Right? Back a couple of times ago?

For our show and tell. I remember meeting Hess also on stage at an event in Seattle as well. Hess, I feel like, has moved around a lot. A spoiler alert on this message, in fact.

I think Hess's partner might be in the military, which is, I believe how that works. Holy crap, Hess writes. I just realized I've been listening to this show for 12 years. Thanks, guys, for being a constant imaginary companion for all these years and making me laugh, even during the hardest of times. I'm also very grateful for all the connections I've made through this wonderful community. Shout out to Megan Tuomi, Megan Lairkamp, Joe and Missy from Waterton, tiffany heiner and the tens of friendos who connected with me after last year's donor message uh thank you all for being a friend on a different note thanks to the military you're being forced to live there you go in hawaii for the next few years depending on when you read this i might already be there now listen i hess obviously i'm not trying to this is such an obvious observation And it's probably one that was grinding Hess's gears People being like, huh, Hawaii must be tough But I mean, I do think Hawaii is kind of a lovely place, right? I mean, yeah, I'm guessing You've made a bunch of connections in wherever you are Say, Clarksville, Tennessee And then you've got to sort of, you know Uproot all of that and then go somewhere else Wherever the other place is Of course, that's going to be challenging

Yeah, I think there's sarcasm here, though We're being forced to live in Hawaii Yes, my life is challenging But I'll take one for the team Hess writes

Okay good okay good got it Okay I'm glad because again you know I've had some work stuff where I've Gone to Hawaii and like yes Hawaii Lovely but if you're working Yeah like even All the people at CBS who sent me To Hawaii for that YouTube kid story Right everybody in New York of course Had to roast me and like all the Producers like oh must be tough And I was like I mean it was a Fun place to go but it is also a six hour Flight it is also you know and it's

also work one thing i know i've said this before but like when i was living in los angeles and kind of having a tough time with work and feeling really stressed out and of course i would drive to the west side which is like you know where a lot of kind of tourists will come to surf and hang out in the beaches around santa monica like it was a mind fluff for me um i love to remember i love the substitution of fluff to like be kind of sitting there super stressed out pulling up to the station like early in the morning and seeing like just sunny beautiful people taking out their surfboards like i actually didn't like that feeling at all like having to work especially if you're so much stressed out around a vacation spot can be tough i'm not trying to take that away from hess this is a move and this sounds like this is going to be great and i'm happy for it but it's not always a given is

what i guess i'm saying sounds though like you're right i think i was misreading the tone of hess's message sounds like Hess is excited about being in Hawaii which is awesome Hess says if there are any 10s living out there I hope to meet you maybe the next TBTL event could be in Hawaii just a suggestion there you go imagine the roasting we'll take from our colleagues in Minnesota when we explain to them mid-December or mid-January that we're going to go ahead and do our next event in Hawaii And they'll all say, hmm, must be tough Yes So your last TV telethon will be especially tough on us Thanks again for providing me With hours of entertainment and companionship I never feel like I'm alone in this community Aloha means hello and goodbye Hello to Hess Hey, thanks, Hess Thanks for supporting the show Hope you're doing well out there in Hawaii Hello and welcome to Top Story. So this Top Story came to me by way of our friend the Stewbots' Twitter feed, actually, because I think his angle into this story was that there was a review written, I think, you know, in a Minnesota newspaper of Bon Jovi's concert that he had in Minnesota. and the review I'm guessing was written by a person that Stu knows maybe was saying that the concert was really bad like Bon Jovi's uh having some problems singing and a lot of people apparently at least according to my reading of Stu's tweet a lot of people were very upset with the person who wrote the review of the Bon Jovi show as being not great um which I clicked on the link from stereo gum um where tom breenan is writing or excuse me brehan is writing uh john bon jovi goes viral for quote shockingly poor concert vocals um so yeah there was uh the twin cities.com had a review where they called his vocal performance uh shockingly poor this uh story has a bunch of um kind of youtube links to performances by bon jovi on this tour that really are and by the way Jon Bon Jovi seems like a sweet guy I've heard stories about him I think he has a he volunteers at a place that prepares meals for people who I think are experiencing homelessness and it's kind of legendary that he is just in there washing dishes like he doesn't he's not the face of the organization he's the dishwashing of the organization which I find to be obviously very laudable so there are really great stories about him just as a person I mean I think he's supposedly a pretty good dude but i was pretty shocked actually by these videos i when i was coming back from the break andrew when we weren't recording i heard you were kind of i

heard you were playing one or listening what is your impression i didn't hear enough do you have

you pulled any more out because like i heard you know a not great performance that was um linked to in this article but i it was the first one i i clicked on and it wasn't enough i mean i'm hearing I'm hearing people you know I'm reading the descriptions of it and it sounds like it's acutely bad whereas what I heard was just sort of muddled and not great

so like here's him doing Wanted Dead or Alive and what he seems to be doing in a lot of these performances is just getting the crowd to sing along yeah that's what I saw so this is him kind of setting up he's going to do Wanted Dead or Alive

and I don't think he even sings here at all for like a long time for a while yeah

does it so we'll skip forward a bit he's playing the guitar so like it's a minute and a half into the song and he has done zero singing just the audience is singing now on the one hand if you go to a bon jovi concert singing along to these eminently singable songs is fun but this very much feels like it's not just for fun it's because he's just not probably capable of singing these songs right now here's him actually singing some of the song now

We'll be right back. It's a little hard to make out because there's somebody just on their phone at the concert, so the audio is not ideal. But what really is striking about it is that it's not just that he's out of tune, because that'll just happen for people that are primarily maybe studio performers. it's that he is clearly struggling to make the sound kind of like with his voice like with his voice box um or vocal box or whatever they call it vocal cords um uh like this is him doing living on a prayer which by the way i'll say this living on a prayer is an is an impossible is an impossible song to sing in the best of times i know this because i once tried it at karaoke and I was barred from ever coming back to that particular Chinese restaurant. Like, Living on a Prayer has roughly 11 key changes. Every time you think you're there, it's like, whoa, we're halfway there. Whoa, that was a key change. You weren't even halfway. It turns out you were not even halfway there. No, you were not even a third at best of how high this song's going to go. So it's a tough song to sing, and, like, this is some of him doing this. And this is where he again just leaves it to the crowd. Again, which is fun for the crowd, but he's just sort of not able to make the sounds happen with his voice. And in this particular article from Stereogum, they mention actually that somebody from the band The Darkness.

Yeah.

Speaking of karaoke hits, our friend Kamaru Kev can really lay down that, I believe in a thing called love, he can really lay it down in the karaoke space. But I think the guy from The Darkness says that he thinks that this is actually like a vocal issue. Justin Hawkins posted a YouTube video commenting on what is going on with Bon Jovi's voice, and he thinks it has to do with his vocal folds or something. there's also they talk to this voice professor who says uh that bon jovi needs to uh talk to a laryngologist um and get his vocal folds looked at because it seems like it might be medical and again it's not there's not really a goldwater rule around speculating on singers medical conditions but i've watched like four or five of these views i know that audio didn't really pay off because again it's like in a concert venue with people on their phones but i'm just telling you having watched a lot of this stuff this doesn't just seem like oh bon jovi's out of tune it seems like Like his body is doing something. And I don't think that this being on tour is the best for him. And I also wonder, what are the rest of the band think? Like, what are the conversations like backstage? Because they have to know that this is right now is not something that Jon Bon Jovi's like vocal cords are really down for.

Well, I have obviously I have no idea what is being said behind closed doors, but my guess just from reading this thing that you sent and again, not even really having a chance to listen to a lot of the examples embedded within. You know, I don't think you mentioned this either, but somewhere in this article, it also mentioned that he had to cancel a tour for a couple of weeks a while back because he caught COVID.

And so, listen, that's interesting. I actually missed that part. That's that is a real possibility, right? Yeah. And so be related to this.

And also, it's age as well. Like, I think we were talking about Huey Lewis. Didn't Huey Lewis kind of lose his voice?

Well, he has something called Meniere's disease or syndrome, which I think is sort of similar to tinnitus. So it's a ring in the ears. He's got a different thing going on.

But either way, it's just kind of like, well, these folks are getting older. That's not a dig. It's just you're getting older. We can't always do the same things that we do when we're older. And the expectation that everybody can just be like the Rolling Stones and still kind of go out there even long past death and still hit those notes, you know, it's not a given.

But the thing is, the Rolling Stones, Andrew, have famously taken care of their bodies, particularly Keith Richards. So it makes sense that they can still – by the way, is that not just the biggest indication that life is a giant crapshoot, the fact that Keith Richards is doing fine and that you've got all these – I mean, Bon Jovi probably runs three miles a day. He still looks amazing, by the way. He's still setting hearts, Twitter painting all across the greater Philadelphia area, including my aunt Kathy, who had not one but two dogs named for Bon Jovi.

I always thought of this is one of those things, too, when you're a little kid and you hear the wrong thing, and it just like it just sticks in your brain. I don't think I've ever actually mentioned this to anybody, but I think about it all the time when I think about my just ridiculously unhealthy lifestyle. But then like George Burns at age like 95, I saw him on some TV show.

a kid and he's just like yeah smoke more cigars and i'm just like see anybody can do which is like the worst thing to do totally worse advice it's just the worst it's not true like yes there's a million things you can do to prevent um you know any kind of catastrophic or even not even catastrophic illness or or whatever we should take care of our bodies but of course we want to just hear the people who are like i live to be 100 because i smoke two stogies a day i'm gonna

he starts every day with four eggs eight slices of bacon and a shot of jack daniels right are you talk about me or burns anyway um so that's there's no accounting for like what's going on with oh bon jovi versus say keith richards yeah but my guess is i mean what i was going to say before

is you said there must be conversations i mean my guess is yes i mean i understand why bon jovi doesn't want to talk about this publicly i mean it's a business he's out there um he's out there performing but my guess is it's not like a secret or a hush hush again i have no idea what the dynamics of rock stars are but my guess is he's going through something and it's obvious and so he's trying to mitigate some things without having to cancel the tour so he's like listen people come to concerts for the experience we'll try to do as much sing-along as possible i'm sure they're my guess is this is something that he and his bandmates and managers and everybody involved know and are trying to address and he probably feels like shit about it and like i'm not some huge bon jovi fan um but like like i really i don't know much about him i don't know if i knew what you were talking about about his volunteer work or whatever but like just generally speaking it's like well i mean i don't know maybe i'm surprised by my compassion here because like boy when i was young did i hate aging rockers like i i mean luke when steel wheels came out i remember thinking the rolling stone should have hung it up a long time ago steel wheels is probably now like a classic record when did that come out 1991 i mean probably 89 30 years ago yeah

and so like literally 30 years ago probably let me look it up i remember yeah you look that up

because i remember the beach boys doing uh what is it bermuda bahamas oh god i'm pretty mom

kokomo and i remember being a child and being 1989 by the way is when steel wheels and i remember

i mean in 89 i was 12 i don't even know what no like 13 i'd be like yeah shut up old man no no i

mean andrew it's more than 30 years ago oh yeah it's 89 i mean well it's hard for me i have a really hard time recognizing that the late 80s and early 90s were that long ago like i think of that as being pretty recent like was like the 90s you know yeah and that's like no that was a long time

ago burbank years 32 years 33 years ago yes yeah so anyway um for being for being a kid with such harsh opinions of aging rockers who i was just i just had that pump that that um that just cockiness of youth just being like the confidence of a much younger you get the boldness of a much younger woman yes but uh you know i just i hear these stories now it's like listen he's got fans he's he's trying it is a job he's going out there he's doing a job and now he's got an illness or something is going on that is getting in the way of that job yet you can't he's not like launching the tour tomorrow like people have already bought tickets like it's a business and it's a huge business and so i'm sort of like just thinking like man you know it also makes me think you know there's been more and more i'm trying to think something went viral recently or maybe it's just kind of a conversation that was in the zeitgeist about how people who are deaf or hard of hearing um also enjoy music through various ways you know whether you can kind of feel the feel the beat feel the music and especially in those live venues you know like going to a rock and roll concert is not just for those who can still hear because it is an experience of celebrating something that you love and and it's more than just the music as well right so I do wonder like if you go to a Bon Jovi concert and you you've read these reviews and maybe some are harsher than than they need to be but it's like wow this guy's voice isn't working but you're like well we're going to go we're going to our bon jovi sing-along led by bon jovi maybe there's still some silver

lining there i think it's not the worst play well that's an that's a really interesting take that i hadn't thought of and i think i think i ultimately sort of side with you it's interesting because the guy who wrote the piece for the pioneer press named ross um rahala uh kind of had a different take on it he's you know writing about this concert was sort of really great for a lot of reasons except for john bon jovi's voice and he said not to put too fine a point on it but one can't help but wonder why no one in the bon jovi organization sat the guy down for an honest chat i guess it's because he's the boss and no one wants to cross him he's always been the face of the group uh but in the time since richie sambora left so i guess there was a falling out between john bon jovi and richie sambora they were kind of like the two sort of main i think you know decision makers maybe in the band uh he's taken since richie sambora left he's taken full control and so I guess

it's this guy's opinion that maybe this is more just bon jovi deciding unilaterally that he wants to be out there and no one really wanting to tell him this is not working that being said the real question would be not for the music critics of the world but i guess for the bon jovi heads did they have a fun time at the show because if they did and also like you said andrew If you're a Bon Jovi head and your choice is No concert Or a concert where Bon Jovi's having a hard time singing But the things you already stated A sing-along led by A Bon Jovi sing-along led by probably The handsomest man you've ever Ever encountered The concept of JBJ He smells like leather, right?

I just always assume he smells like I mean, I know that he was famous for wearing a leather jacket But even when he's not wearing a leather jacket and he smells like leather, but not in a bad way, right?

But, I mean, also, like, factor this in. He played one of his newer songs. This was the show that he played in the Twin Cities. One of his new songs, American Reckoning, which he wrote after the murder of George Floyd and dedicated to Floyd's daughter, Gianna. I mean, it's like, it sounds like he's on the right side of a lot of this stuff, you know, that in terms of, like, the culture and and and ways we think about the world so again i am like everything in me is very pro bon jovi as a human i think again unless there's stuff i don't know and as you said andrew probably for the people that were at these shows other than the ones that were uh filming it and putting it on tiktok and saying john bon jovi he very sick except for those ones most of the people in those rooms were probably happy to be there as opposed to not being there as opposed to the concert not

happening and maybe especially if you're if you're prepared for it if you don't know about any of this and you go you might just be like wow what's going on with him that was rough and maybe it would take you out of it but if you knew and you think about it from a perspective of oh okay well we have these tickets and this is like almost like um you know what like an act of god or whatever do they still call it that act of god there must be a force majeure force majeure yeah i want to see that movie it's been out for well over a decade now i think um but anyway uh yeah you know it's funny because you mentioned it okay so you mentioned that song let me also be honest andrew and i

don't want to general i don't want to generalize here or stereotype but i have a sense of kind of maybe the demo that's most excited to be in that arena watching jbj there's an amount of white claw that will be consumed that will mean that the actual vocal performance starts to move to

the back of the experience right also and if you're like me you can't hear for shit anymore anyway so you probably won't even hear the vocals are bad you're just gonna hear the people singing around you I was gonna say you know you mentioned that um he wrote a song dedicated to George Floyd like I didn't know any of that I I did I have no idea or had no idea where Bon Jovi stands on things but it is funny just to sort of check myself for a second here I guess this whole conversation would be just completely different if this was Ted Nugent. Yeah, I was thinking Rock, but suddenly I was going to say Chris Rock. Oh, Kid Rock. Yeah, Chris Rock would be a different conversation, but no, if it was Kid Rock, Ted Nugent,

somebody who has bad takes, it would be, we would be just

savaging them. But those people are also loudly onerous. You know what I mean? I didn't know what John Bon Jovi's situation was when we came into this. I wasn't like defending him because I feel like, oh, he's somebody who shares my values. I had no idea. Just generally speaking, that compassion was coming from a place of just like, well, this is a business and he's a human and they're finding ways to get through it. It's like using the Kid Rock, aka Chris Rock example that I'm using, I'm going so far. Kid Rock. I'm looking for somebody. That's a combo of the two. I'm looking for an extreme example of people that I actively hate, whereas I don't think there are a lot of musicians like that.

No, but you are absolutely right. Because I think of, and Bon Jovi's like, he loves the Stern show. He had Stern induct him into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. And he's on the show sometimes. And also, I just, I'll tell you what, growing up, like when Slippery When Wet came out, which I believe was the album that had Living on a Prayer and Maybe You Give Love a Bad Name, uh i was i was a a grade school student and i was not allowed to listen to that kind of music but it was on probably cube 93 which is now sports talk in seattle andrew which for people that grew up i mean that's like wmms yeah being also the stage like just simulcasting whatever the am sports talk would be in cleveland like it is a mind fluff to know that cube 93 once the home of the tea man and Shelly in the morning and And also, Eric Powers to the people is now just playing Softie and Ian Furness. I can't, but whatever.

It would be amazing if the T-Man was doing commercials for low-T treatments. That would be amazing.

Cuckoo, cachoo. The T-Man coming at you for Dr. Eric Kaki. I wonder what ever happened to Rob Tepper, the T-Man. That guy, so I want the, again, this is a very Seattle-specific thing, but you know there was this guy the t-man was a radio sensation i remember he had a night show on kjr so he was doing a sports show for a while and it was just completely insane he was in this persona of the t-man and nobody knew his real name there were no photos of him available it was this whole thing and he was so popular in this like otherwise totally like abandoned time slot which of course later tbtl would fail in which would be the 7 to 10 p.m a.m radio slot that then they moved him to the morning show on the hip-hop station cube 93 because it was all in the same you know radio cluster and then that show was a phenomenon that was the closest thing in seattle we ever had to like everyone was like did you hear what happened on the and it wasn't shelly was terry free sorry was the um the the sidekick uh on the it was the t-man and terry free and steven kilbreath on traffic and that was like everyone i knew was listening to that show every morning it was like you had to hear what they got up to and now it's just um you know now it's just a way to sell more uh get more ears on a um you know some kind of slab jack whatever they're advertising over there on the uh the sports station it did occur to me

there may be slab jacking in my future i i look around we don't have most of our walkways around Maybe for the pickleball court? Maybe for the pickleball court. But most of our walkways around here are, I'm thinking of something, I don't know if it was a private conversation between me and, can we say this, that your brother, can we talk about this, that your brother has achieved something, your brother David, he has. Yes, he has. Is this okay to say it's not a secret? Sure, I think so. Yeah, so. He got his real estate license. Yeah, he was texting me the other day. I didn't know that that was something he was working on because I'm a terrible friend, but he officially has his real estate license now and he automatically started texting me. He's like, hey, I know you just moved in but if you're ready to flip that house yet but just so you know, it will increase value if there's a pickleball court. I was just like, man, this is a money market.

He's going to be on. He'll have one of those Bravo TV shows where he's the real estate king of Bellingham soon.

Oh, I know what I was going to tell you too so I don't know if we'll have to do any slab jacking here in the distant future if any of my little walkways are out of whack. But Genevieve has been obsessed with like kind of learning about the flora and fauna in our front little yard area because, you know, things are, it's spring, things are starting to sprout, but not everything is flowering yet. So she's using the app on her phone. I think maybe the same when you were using Luke to identify trees. I don't know. I think she was using a Google product. But anyway, she got excited because something is growing in our garden and it hasn't bloomed yet, but they're just like little buds. And she's like, you know that drop of Cisco talking about the big, beautiful balls, the big, beautiful purple balls? She's like, I think we have those. That's what's going to grow there. I was like, well, there you go. Are you kidding me? I love it. I'll have to send photos. Beautiful purple balls. No, wait, that wasn't Cisco.

No, that's your Cisco impression. I think it's pretty good.

Big, beautiful purple balls. Now let's hear his.

Now let's hear the real one. Beautiful purple balls.

There's no big. I just added a big. Like, I ACDC'd that up. Sure.

Let's see. Here's some. Some guys like them thin. Some guys like them tacky. Some guys like them brand new. Some guys like old balls. I mean, they're all different.

Tom Brady explaining how he didn't have the footballs deflated before the game.

Boy, I'll tell you what. Whenever I think of that now, all I remember is one of the Sklar brothers continuing to correct me over email that it was deflate gate, not inflate gate. Oh, because you were having them on your radio show down in LA? Yeah, of course. They're like regular. How about this, Andrew?

Remember when I wanted to put the cereal theme under everything? Yeah. That was a moment for the show. Previously on cereal.

You know, everybody has a preference. Some guys like them round, and some guys like them thin. Some guys like them tacky. Some guys like them brand new. Some guys like old balls. I mean, they're all different.

I guess that was all I did.

I thought maybe there would be some more production. So I guess we were going deep. Did TBTL end up cracking that case wide open? I can't remember.

I, you know, weirdly enough And I think we all knew we would end up on Deflategate here Inflategate Excuse me, wait, no, it was deflate

No, it was deflate, but I kept In emails, I just had a million things going on And I kept on referring to it as inflategate And he kept on writing back, it's deflate gate

I wish I could have talked to whichever Sklar

i can't remember which one it was they also have the weirdest email addresses do you remember that it's like it's no let me look it's not like it's not their names because what are their names randy and jason i think but it's like some other weird name uh not weird but just a name that's not randy or jason if i remember right but that little comment telling you it's deflate gate set you back in terms of your sports confidence by 20 years actually no because i knew that one

no that one didn't it just sticks in my brain because I was like I know that but I was like I think I could be wrong about this Luke but I feel like it was something I just kept doing and it was kind of funny it wasn't that commented on it was just it just reminded me of that I just kept on calling because for some reason I couldn't I mean I knew what the story was but for some reason I kept calling it Inflategate I don't want to give out their

exact email name or whatever but it's a different name that's not it's Randy's uh email address but when it shows up in my thing it shows up with a different first name which maybe is middle name or real i don't know that yeah i looked up a little interest on this show but i just for some reason that always stuck with me too i was like wait are you who you say

i love those guys by the way i think they're very funny yeah what an interesting career too i mean boy like i was surprised this is this isn't super i shouldn't take the show here but you know we play a piece of tape on here um you've been playing it for years of david cross saying i've lost hundreds of pounds and gained hundreds of confidence i believe and then years later i ended up finding the broader um drop of that like kind of the the more tape around that on cheap seats i don't know what the name of the show was but it was some sort of like sports show on comedy central that

yeah i think it was called cheap seats yeah i had no idea that thing even existed like the

scholars you go back in history like you can find cave paintings of the scholars making jokes about crog you know they're real like they're real zellig figures i feel like just look in the back

of any like jfk's assassination and like uh you know bobby thompson's the shot heard around the world you'll just see golfing jason and randy's car in the background what yeah that was regrettable they were actually part of the plumbers like they were they were implicated in a lot of really Intense stuff Anyway We should We should talk Emails and V-mails here So maybe that means We will We will talk about The This Dennis Reynolds Find in a Goodwill in Austin Yeah that's a good story We should talk about that It really is There's a lot There are a lot of Dazzling deets there So we'll talk about that tomorrow

Here I go Once again With the email Every week I hope that it's from a female No man It's not from a female

all right speaking of emails and v-mails what do you got for me my friend did you ever hear back

from seattle sports writer matt hulkins yesterday you wrote into him to mention

absolutely did not which i guess is kind of the way that i would like what i would like to have happen is he he receives the the email in the spirit it was intended and he just kind of makes a mental note and then just you know goes forth with that knowledge i don't need to hear back from him i certainly would be bummed if he was offended by it or if he was like really um so again i just hope it just drops into his consciousness and much like happened to me he just knows the difference now between begs the question and raises the just internalizes it well

it turns out in our it is a complicated thing and begs the question does not mean the same thing as raises the question even though people use it interchangeably now um but i think both of us but i'll put it mainly on me i think i always get i always forget what the true because it is complicated and the true definition of begging the question i get it confused with a tautology which i don't remember the example i gave out yesterday but i gave out a tautology which is almost like a circular logic um god must exist because god exists that would be a tautology but That's not begging the question. And nobody actually even called in to correct us on this.

Well, they're too tired because every time the topic of begging the question comes up, I give an example that is, in fact, not technically begging the question. And for years, the listeners would correct me. And I think they've just given up on the whole thing at this point.

Well, this is really cool. We got this voicemail because I'm going to remember. Well, I say that. I'll forget it by tomorrow. But I hope to remember this voicemail because Christian called in with a perfect example of begging the question. that made it clear to me, and then I went back and did a little bit more research. Take a listen to this.

Hi, friendos. Listener Christian in Portland here listening to you guys talk about begging the question versus raising the question. A couple of nights ago at dinner, my nine-year-old daughter hit me with a perfect example of begging the question when she said, Dad, are you ever going to start being cool? And I took that as an opportunity. to explain that particular logical fallacy and why I disagreed with it. Well, middle-aged dad type, power out. I love the way that you're trying to convince your kid as cool by explaining what begging the question means, which is a real cool move. But to me, and then I looked up, I'm like, wait, then what does it mean exactly? And it means it's not circular logic, but it's asking a question that is based on a fact that could be disputable, and so therefore it begs the question. So, in other words, the daughter asking, are you ever going to be cool, that begs the question, am I not cool now or am I not cool now? And I looked it up and there was another example I read on Masterclass.com that actually finally got through to me that was kind of like, let's say that you and I are planning a trip to Vegas and we're talking about whether or not we're going to fly or drive. And I say to you, but if we fly to Vegas, we don't get to drive across the desert, which begs the question, did we ever want to drive across the desert? Like maybe we did. But, you know, the question holding an assumption that that isn't necessarily founded is what begging the question means.

Does that make sense? Yes, I see. You know, for the fact that this has come up conservatively a hundred times on the show and that I'm still learning about. And also, by the way, I sent the wrong thing to Matt Calkins is is amazing.

You said that. Oh, because you. Well, my description of what it was wrong.

I was basically describing a tautology to instead of what you're talking about, which is. And I'm wondering, is Beggs the Question, the shortening of Beggars the Question? Because I'll see that sometimes. really people that want to go next level they'll say or they'll say it beggars belief which i think is different it means it's hard to believe right but is begs the question short for beggars the

question at some point i don't know i do believe that it's some sort of a translate i mean this is an this is an ancient like term that uh you know it's like a philosophy term that probably you know i don't think beg has anything to do with the way we think of beg in the modern context i think it's So here are three examples from Masterclass. I don't know if this is going to make things clearer or not. Actually, I'll just give you one. The argument that dogs are better than cats because dogs are loyal begs the question, what about dogs that aren't loyal? So in other words, it's kind of raising a – it's raising a question.

It's assuming that all dogs are loyal. Exactly. And the statement is premise on the idea that all dogs are loyal, but there may be a disloyal dog out there, which then would counter that.

It's kind of more like questioning the premise, I believe, and that's dumbing it down maybe a little bit too much. But anyway, I thought that was interesting, and so hopefully the next time this comes up, I'll try to remember, Christian, hey, are you ever going to be cool? Well, that begs the question, am I not cool now? There's, I think, Kixi Radio, of course, my favorite AM radio station. Of course, we all know that their slogan is music is cool now as it was then. That kind of begs the question, too. It really does. Was it cool then?

there may some of it may not have been like what's a song they play on kick see that wasn't even cool then probably like um uh splish splash what's that what's that song called i feel like i know who did that too that's peter um splish splash i was taking a bath on a lonely saturday night

was that song that's not peter rabbit is it that's what i'm trying to think of no and that's probably not even what is that song even no no peter rabbit is a cartoon character eddie rabbit is who I was trying to think of. That's Eddie Rabbit? No, what are Eddie Rabbit songs? I think Eddie Rabbit is a song about driving in the rain or something like that, right?

Let's see. Splish Splash song. That's Bobby Darin. Bobby Darin.

Okay, that was me.

I mean, let me just tell you right now, though, like Beyond the Sea and Bobby Darin's version of Mac the Knife, like these are all, these are classics that I like. Just Splish Splash doesn't really work for me.

No, I don't like that song, either i get them confused the reason i thought of eddie rabbit there is because i think these were all songs that maybe like maybe my dad sang to us when we were little um eddie rabbit yeah and so like i sort of maybe splish splash i was taking a bathroom you know i could see my parents singing

that to me my mom probably sang that to me when i was in the bath too i'm gonna try to play just

a little bit of this hoping that um spotify doesn't have its spiders out is this i love a

rainy night i actually like this song and he's also i think the other song that you would know

is driving my life away and i'm just like oh yeah like i love that yeah right anyway uh somebody

covers i love a rainy night um it's like a country band and i feel like i um i used to like that song as well like i don't even know if i knew the eddie rabbit version but i i had heard like a maybe 90s cover it that I enjoyed quite so. Of course, we can't play any of this lest we get pulled. No. So just sing it along in your head, people.

You know, let me play one more voicemail for you. This came in a while back. This was regarding a conversation we apparently had about dunking food. I'm hoping the listener explains this. I pulled this a while back, but we're talking about dunking food in our beverages. Oh, I think the – I know. I mentioned as an aside this viral video of a guy at a – I believe it was a Yankees game. and he was sitting there with his hot dog and his beer and he didn't have any condiments on his hot dog and he just started dunking his hot dog in the beer and then eating it. With the bun too. With the bun, exactly. Hot dog and bun into the beer. Exactly, and so we were talking about that a little bit.

This is Dunk Your Food Talk and I'm here for it. I love a French chip sandwich. Is that so different from dunking a hot dog in beer? I'm not sure. I'm not going to try ducking a hot dog in beer, but I do enjoy a soggy roll with roast beef in it. So there's that. Oreos in milk, of course, but did you also take graham crackers and dip them in milk and break the graham cracker apart into the rectangles and, like, sort of swish it in the milk until it was so soggy that it was about to fall apart and then you eat it? Like, that's delicious. And then, of course, oh, shoot, there was one other food dipping. Oh, when you were talking about it changing the beverage, hot chocolate with, like, a peanut butter sandwich, not peanut butter and jelly, but just, like, peanut butter on bread, and you dip that in your hot chocolate. It's like a Reese's peanut butter cup. It's delicious. Of course, I did that as a kid with, like, white bread. I don't know how that would do with wheat bread. It might have too much flavor or graininess to the wheat bread.

That begs the question, are we not eating white bread anymore?

No, I don't know if that one's going to work these days, but back in the white bread days, some peanut butter bread dipped in hot chocolate, yes. So soggy, yes. Delicious, yes. So I'm not going to judge beer guy, beer hot dog guy, even if I am not excited to try it myself. Love you guys.

Yeah, like I was saying too, like out of the things people do with food, like I have no desire to dunk a hot dog with a bun into a beer and eat it. That doesn't sound good to me. But it also doesn't sound like I would do that before eating cottage cheese. That's for damn sure. You know, it doesn't sound like the worst thing you can do.

The thing to me, though, about the French dip analogy or comparison is the crustiness of the French dip bread is fundamentally different than the softness of most hot dog buns. I'm thinking of the kind of traditional, you know, like, not like a hot dog bun that's artisanal or especially large and crusty. I'm just talking about the kind of typical one that you'd get at a ballgame, wrapped in foil, steamed. You know what I'm talking about? Mm-hmm. That bun is already—and those are the kind of buns that I like, by the way. That bun is already—it's pretty—it's soft. And if you dip that in a substance like a beer, you're going to get a sogginess that I feel like is welcomed in the French dip situation because the bread is really crusty. So you dip it in the au jus, and it doesn't get as soggy because the bread is a little bit different than a hot dog bun. Does that make any sense?

Sort of, except as a man who has eaten – and I know that you've had your fair share of French dips. But as a man who eats a lot of French dips even to this day.

Including today for lunch, I'm sure.

Actually, after this conversation, actually, Tubbs does do some sort of an au jus dip thing that I'll try. And that will not be on a very crusty bun. Like there are some French dips that have a very crusty bun and that's maybe like kind of even toasted a little bit. And therefore, the au jus will soften that up. And I know what you're talking about.

That's an Eddie Rabbit song, right? Oh, I love a crusty bun.

But it is not a given. There are also some really, really good French dip sandwiches. In fact, like the original French dip sandwiches that are served – or the allegedly originals that are served at places like Kohl's and Philippe's in L.A., those are not crusty buns, if I recall. They're actually a very soft white kind of French – not French bread, not a crusty French bread, but like a soft, I don't know, baguette or something.

You know, I used to go to – that baguette's the question, Andrew. What? That doesn't even make sense. Baguette-ing the question? Yes. Um, I, uh, that reminds me, there was a place, I, I don't know if it's still open in Bellingham, but we have a fair number of listeners up there. It was called, um, the wild oat and it's a vegetarian cafe and.

most of the recipes were just developed by the woman who owns the restaurant you know so she's got sort of like a um a fake uh fish sandwich that is yeah so convincing i swear i mean you know it's like a it's sort of like a fish stick on a sandwich but there's you know some kind of vegan mayo and lettuce and it is i remember that being so i don't even like fish sandwiches but i liked this it wasn't too early it turned out to get this andrew but also she's got a french dip that she makes that i it's shocking because you just would think that might be hard to pull off for whatever reason but it was as good as any french dip that i've had anywhere and you dip it in some kind of aju you know again all this stuff is is just veggie based but i'm i if you're in bellingham and for some reason you don't eat meat and you want to have a delicious french dip sandwich go to the wild oat if it's still open that place was amazing speaking of fish sandwiches

I'm sure you saw this, maybe a quick homage here. Did you hear that Traffic Jam Jimmy did pass away this weekend? Yeah, a Baltimore institution passed away. I don't know the details. Aside from that and seeing some public mourning.

Wow, what a bummer. Yeah. RIP Traffic Jam Jimmy, you gave us one of the most iconic TBTL drops of all time. For those who don't remember, he didn't realize that he was on the air. This was he was a guy who was the traffic reporter, I think, for some TV stations or a TV station. But the shtick was he would drive around, I think, and do the traffic reports. And he didn't realize that he was on air and he was in line at like a was it a McDonald's?

It was a McDonald's. Yeah, I would just say in like with all due respect to those who have passed. I believe the bit was he didn't realize he was on there. I think he knew very damn well he was. I mean, this is just me. I mean, yeah. I mean, I don't know that his colleague back in the studio knew he was going to do this, but he was a character. And like, I've watched this a lot because in the in the I think I've always felt this way because I'm absolutely no fun. But you always think that about everything. Yeah. Often, right. This is what always this is a performer. This is a guy who's performing and he knows that he's playing this character. And so, like, I think that he surprised his colleague who's like the weather person who's in the in the studio who's tossing to him for traffic but like we see him in the shot it's like we see a big mcdonald's pillow behind him in the back seat and he's like oh sorry i didn't know that you're gonna come to me right now she even says i told you i was coming to you so i i think that he was playing it up maybe he wouldn't know exactly where he would be in the line but i think that he knew that it would be this is just my own theory he knew it would be pretty funny if he was

in line at mcdonald's what always happens is you think that something is sus about like what is a a moment of pure joy for me and the rest of the american people some like thing happens and you're like yeah this is a setup and i'm always like it's not and then it turns out to be a setup so i will i will i will basically concede that you're usually right about this stuff so you're probably right about and i don't think i've watched the video as much as you have i just remember at the time thinking it was funny and i and it is funny i don't think i just kind of got caught but um but you know like i said you're you actually usually write on this stuff so i will defer to you uh that it was uh you know possibly staged but either way rest in peace you brought us joy you continue to bring us joy he's um you know what andrew in heaven it's never too early to get a fish that's a nice tribute fish sandwich available two for Sev for Traffic Jam Jimmy

R.I.P. I'm going to let you choose the show title today I think it should be because it was natural in conversation but getting the question I think it's got to be that I did write down fear of being included which I feel like we might have used before and even though we didn't say this I just wanted you to know I did write down early in the show just in case we need a show title the more the meowier get that in there we won't use it but probably begetting

the question right that's probably that's probably a good one and if only we had a show pick andrew

i just nothing comes to mind well take a traffic jam or no probably a french tip or something

nothing interesting or cute has been happening in my life involving a certain new resident of this apartment i'll go take a picture of a sandwich okay good at tubs i drove by tubs the other day and i thought of you so good job now officially you are like the most associated in my mind you are most associated with that stretch of lake city way oh if this listener is still

listening whoever texted me and told me that you heard that there might be unfortunately an expiration date on that tub's location aka my tub's location in lake city you were right i had heard tell that they were opening another um branch in bothell do they call them branches or location i consider it like a bank it's like uh That's me.

my own personal sandwich bank that I'm always withdrawing from. But it turns out I went in there. I said, hey, I heard you're opening another place in Bothell. But I also heard a rumor that that means this place is going to shutter. And the kid behind the counter said, yeah, I think that's the long term plan. But we'll be here for now. So thanks a lot, Bothell, for a day or for a lifetime.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Whoa. What? I know. Don't let your anger. don't let don't don't turn your anger towards a town where many of our listeners live

just stealing our sandwich shops like what i'm supposed to just lay i'm just supposed to just like be quiet about it i'm not supposed to be the change i want to see in the world

you well you know what you have to do you need to start you have to figure out how much does the tubs on lake city need to make per day and then you need to spend that at that tubs every single day i mean it's this is a solvable problem if you're willing to dedicate roughly four to five hundred dollars per day of your own resources to the tub sandwich shop do

you know if angioplasties are covered in their current uh health plan i'm gonna go with no

because nothing is covered by our how are we the only people that work in public radio that have absolute shite coverage like the deal with public radio and government jobs and things like that Where maybe you're not making an extremely, you know, huge amount of money up front is you get good vacation, you get good medical and dental, you get a good pension. It's like that's where the payoff is from doing, you know, one of those kinds of jobs. And in my experience, public radio has usually fallen into that category, but not us, not us.

Well, a health plan means they plan on giving us a huge deductible. That's what I understand about health plans.

Yes, that was the plan. And they've been successful with that Anyway, that seems like a good place to end the show

Yeah, sure, nice little bow on that

Yep Hey, thanks everyone for hanging out with us today We are going to be back here tomorrow More imaginary radio for you Until then, have a great Wednesday We'll see you tomorrow morning Until then, please remember, no mountain too tall And good luck to all

Let's start off with our traffic jam, Jimmy. He's out in our Lens Solar Mobile track, and he's been everywhere from Pennsylvania, now down through Towson. Hi, Jimmy. What's the latest?

Hello. Please hold forward to the next speaker. Hey, is it too early to get a fish sandwich? Oh, next speaker. Hang on. Oh, Candice, we live? Whoops. Hey, I've been in the car since 4 o'clock. I'm starving. I'm just getting something real quick. Hey, too early to get a fish sandwich? Okay, well. I have an alky. Yeah, can I get a fish sandwich? We're on breakfast right now. Breakfast? All right, give me an egg McMuffin and a black coffee. Thank you. What size would you like? Medium. All right, I'll tell you, folks. Stay put. It's bad out here. I've been out since 4. Stay put, folks. Trust me. I didn't know we were coming live. I'm sorry. Anyway, I'm hungry, so I'm going to get a little something to eat. Expect you to work for eight hours in the car. You've got to eat, Candice. All right, anyway, don't tell the boss I did this. How much are you, buddy?

4.46.

4.46. All right. All right, I'll be back in a little while. All right.

Second time. I've seen you this week.

Second time.

I told you we were coming to you. All right.

Power out.